Variability of North American English /r/ production in response to palatal perturbation.
| Number | 1667 |
|---|---|
| Year | 2010 |
| Drawer | 28 |
| Entry Date | 12/15/2011 |
| Authors | Tiede, M.K., Boyce, S.E., Espy-Wilson, C.Y. & Gracco, V.L. |
| Contact | |
| Publication | In B.Maassen & P. van Lieshout, eds., Speech Motor Control: New Developments in Basic and Applied Research. Oxford University Press, pp. 53-67. |
| url | http://www.haskins.yale.edu/Reprints/HL1667.pdf |
| Abstract | It is well established that the lowered third formant constituting the primary acoustic percept of American english /r/ can be achieved with different tongue shapes in production, which may be broadly grouped into “bunched” and “retroflex” production strategies. There is also evidence showing that some speakers select one or the other of these production strategies depending on the coproduction context, thus suggesting that the tow are motorically equivalent. The research question pursued in this work is whether such motor equivalent. The research question pursued in this work is whether such motor equivalence in /r/ production is a generally accessible property of fluency in American English. While the vocal tract morphology of a given speaker may lead her to prefer one tongue shape uniformly, introduction of a perturbation interfering with normal articulation habits may potentially induce that speaker to explore the use of an alternative shape. To investigate this possibility, subjects in this study were fitted with a custom palatal prosthesis incorporating a protrusion along the alveolar ridge, and observed during /r/ production with and without the prosthesis using electromagnetometry. Results show that a majority of subjects responded to the artificial palate by alternating between tongue shapes. Regardless of tongue shape, no subjects showed significant differences across condition in formant patterns for /r/. All subjects showed a pattern of motor equivalence between tongue constriction location and corresponding lip protrusion, as displaced by the palate or as an aftereffect of wearing it. These results are consistent with the primacy of acoustic goals in the production of /r/. |
| Notes |
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